chapter 7Training of HRM

Editor's Notes

• #2: Companies are in business to make money, and every business function is under pressure to show how it contributes to business success or face spending cuts and even outsourcing. To contribute to a company’s success, training activities should help the company achieve its business strategy. There is both a direct and an indirect link between training and business strategy and goals. Training can help employees develop skills needed to perform their jobs, which directly affects the business. Giving employees opportunities to learn and develop creates a positive work environment, which supports the business strategy by attracting talented employees as well as motivating and retaining current employees. the conditions through which training practices can help companies gain competitive advantage and how managers can contribute to a high-leverage training effort and create a learning organization Chapter 7, training, discussed a systematic and effective approach to training design reviews training methods and training evaluation and concludes with a discussion of training issues including cross-cultural preparation, managing diversity, and socializing employees.
• #3: Learning Objectives include: Discuss how training can contribute to companies’ business strategy. Explain the manager’s role in identifying training needs and supporting training on the job. Conduct a needs assessment. Evaluate employees’ readiness for training. Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of presentation, hands-on, and group training methods.
• #4: Learning Objectives include: Explain potential e-learning training advantages. Design a training session to maximize learning. Choose an appropriate evaluation design based on training objectives and analysis of constraints. Design a cross-cultural preparation program. Develop a program for effectively managing diversity.
• #5: Training can Increase employees’ knowledge of foreign competitors and cultures. Help ensure that employees have skills to work with new technology. Help employees understand how to work effectively in teams to contribute to product and service quality.
• #6: Ensure that the company’s culture emphasizes innovation, creativity, and learning. Ensure employment security by providing new ways for employees to contribute when their : jobs change or interests change skills become obsolete Prepare employees to accept and work more effectively with each other, particularly with minorities and women.
• #7: In general, training refers to a planned effort by a company to facil­itate the learning of job‑related knowledge, skills, or behavior by employees. High‑leverage training is links training to strategic business goals, has top management support, relies on an instructional design model, and is benchmarked to programs in other organizations. Continuous learning is a learning system that requires employees to understand the entire work process and expects them to acquire new skills, apply them on the job, and share what they have learned with other employees. Today, training is being evaluated not on the basis of the number of programs offered and training activity in the company but on how training addresses business needs related to learning, behavior change, and performance improvement. In fact, training is becoming more performance-focused
• #8: Figure 7.1 shows the strategic training and development process with examples of strategic initiatives, training activities, and metrics. The strategic training and development process involves identifying strategic training and development initiatives that will help achieve the business strategy. Employees participate in specific training and development activities that support these initiatives. The final step of the process involves collecting measures or metrics. The metrics are used to determine if training helped contribute to goals related to the business strategy. This discussion is not meant to underestimate the importance of “traditional training” (a focus on acquisition of knowledge, skills, and abilities), but it should alert you that for many companies, training is evolving from a focus on skills to an emphasis on learning and creating and sharing knowledge.
• #9: Thetraining design process refers to a systematic approach for developing training programs.Needs assessment refers to the process used to determine if training is necessary. There are often pressure points that may suggest that training is necessary.Organizational analysis involves determining the business appropriate­ness of training. Person analysis helps the manager identify whether training is appropriate and which employees need training. Task analysis identifies the conditions in which tasks are performed. A job is a specific position requiring the completion of specific tasks. Ensuring Employees' Readiness for Training—Motivation to learnis the desire of the trainee to learn the content of the training program. Creating a Learning Environment—For employees to acquire knowl­edge and skills in the training program and to apply this information in their jobs, the training program must to include specific learning principles Table 7.1 presents the six steps of this process, which emphasizes that effective training practices involve more than just choosing the most popular or colorful training method. Step 1 is to assess needs to determine if training is needed. Step 2 involves ensuring that employees have the motivation and basic skills to master training content. Step 3 addresses whether the training session (or the learning environment) has the factors necessary for learning to occur.
• #10: Transfer of training refersto the use of knowledge, skills, and behaviors learned in trainingon the job. Selecting Training Methods—Survey results indicate that instructor-led classroom, workbooks and manuals, and videos are the most frequently used training methods. Step 4 is to ensure that trainees apply the content of training to their jobs. This requires support from managers and peers for the use of training content on the job as well as getting the employee to understand how to take personal responsibility for skill improvement. learning environment to achieve the training objectives. Step 5 involves choosing a training method. A variety of training methods are available ranging from traditional on-the-job training to newer technologies such as the Internet. The key is to choose a training method that will provide the appropriate learning environment to achieve the training objectives. Step 6 is evaluation—that is, determining whether training achieved the desired learning outcomes and/or financial objectives. The training design process should be systematic yet flexible enough to adapt to business needs. Different steps may be completed simultaneously.
• #11: Needs assessment refers to the process used to determine if training is necessary. There are often pressure points that may suggest that training is necessary (text Figure 7.2). A needs assessment usually involves organizational analysis, person analysis, and task analysis. Organizational analysis involves determining the business appropriateness of training, given the company’s business strategy, its resources available for training, and support by managers and peers for training activities. It is necessary to identify whether the company has the budget, time, and expertise for training. Person analysis helps identify who needs training. factors that influence employees’ performance and learning are person characteristics, input, output, consequences, and feedback. Person characteristics refer to the employees’ knowledge, skill, ability, and attitudes. Input relates to the instructions that tell employees what, how, and when to perform. Input also refers to the support given to employees to help them perform. Output refers to the job’s performance standards. Consequences are the incentives employees receive for performing well. Feedback is the information employees receive while they are performing. Person analysis involves (1) determining whether performance deficiencies result from a lack of knowledge, skill, or ability (a training issue) or from a motivational or work-design problem; (2) identifying who needs training; and (3) determining employees’ readiness for training. Task analysis includes identifying the important tasks and knowledge, skill, and behaviors that need to be emphasized in training for employees to complete their tasks. Reasons or “pressure points ”include • Legislation • Lack of basic skills • Poor performance • New technology • Customer requests • New products • Higher performance standards • New jobs • Business growth or contraction • Global business expansion 3 Questions: What is the context? Who needs training? In what do they need training? Outcomes: • What trainees need to learn? • Who receives training • Type of training • Frequency of training • Buy-versus-build training decision • Training versus other HR options such as selection or job redesign • How training should be evaluated? Managers need to consider three factors before choosing training as the solution to any pressure point: the company’s strategic direction, the training resources available, and support of managers and peers for training activities. This support includes resources such as equipment, time, or budget. Support also includes feedback and reinforcement from managers and peers.
• #12: Managers need to consider three factors before choosing training as the solution toany pressure point: the company’s strategic direction, the training resources available,and support of managers and peers for training activities. peer and manager support for training is critical. Key factors to success are a positive attitude among peers and managers about participation in training activities; managers’ and peers’ willingness to tell trainees how they can more effectively use knowledge, skills, or behaviors learned in training on the job; and the availability of opportunities for the trainees to use training content in their jobs. If peers’ and managers’ attitudes and behaviors are not supportive, employees are not likely to apply training content to their jobs. Strategic training and development initiatives are learning-related actions that a company should take to help achieve its business strategy. Initiatives are based on the business environment, an understanding of the company’s goals and resources and insight into potential training and development options. They provide the company with a road map to guide specific training and development activities and show how training will help the company reach its goals and add value. The plan or goal the company chooses to achieve strategic objectives has a major impact on whether resources (money, trainers’ time, program development) should be devoted to addressing a training pressure point.
• #13: From a manager’s perspective, to determine if training is needed, for any performance problem you need to analyze characteristics of the performer, input, output, consequences, and feedback. How might this be done? Based on this model (Text, Figure 7.3) ask several questions regarding these 5 factors to determine if training is the likely solution to a performance problem. If employees lack the knowledge and skill to perform and the other factors are satisfactory, training is needed. If employees have the knowledge and skill to perform, but input, output, consequences, or feedback are inadequate, training may not be the best solution. For example, if poor performance results from faulty equipment, training cannot solve this problem, but repairing the equipment will! If poor performance results from lack of feedback, then employees may not need training, but their managers may need training on how to give performance feedback.
• #14: Managers can ensure motivation to learn by ensuring self-efficacy, the understanding of the benefits of or consequences of training, awareness of training, work environment characteristics and basic skills. Motivation to learn is the desire of the trainee to learn the content of the training program. Self-efficacy is the employees' belief that they can successfully learn the content of the training program.
• #15: Managers can increase employee’s self-efficacy level by following guidelines: Let employees know that the purpose of training is to improve performance rather than to identify areas in which employees areincompetent. Provide as much information as possible about the training program and purpose prior to actual training. Show employees their peers’ training success. Provide employees feedback that learning is under their control they have the ability and responsibility to overcome learning difficulties experienced in the program.
• #16: Cognitive ability includes three dimensions: verbal comprehension, quantitative ability, and reasoning ability. Verbal comprehension refers to the person’s capacity to understand and use written and spoken language. Managers should be sure the readability (the difficulty level of written material) of training material does not exceed that required by the job. A readability assessment usually involves analysis of sentence length and word difficulty.
• #17: Learning permanently changes behavior. For employees to acquire knowledge and skills in the training program and apply this information in their jobs, seven conditions under which employees learn best include Need to know why they should learn. Meaningful training content. Opportunities to practice. Feedback. Observe experience and interact with others Good program coordination and administration Commit training content to memory These conditions for learning and their importance and application to training are also noted in Table 7.6 in the text. Employees learn by observing, experiencing and interacting. Employees need the training program to be properly coordinated and administered. and they need to commit the training content to memory.
• #18: Transfer of training refers to on-the-job use of knowledge, skills, and behaviors learned in training. Transfer of training is influenced by the climate for transfer, manager support, peer support, opportunity to use learned capabilities, technology support, and self-management skills (text Figure 7.5) Climate for transfer refers to trainees’ perceptions about a wide variety of characteristics of the work environment that facilitate or inhibit use of trained skills or behavior. These characteristics include manager and peer support, opportunity to use skills, and the consequences for using learned capabilities. Manager support refers to the degree to which trainees’ managers (1) emphasize the importance of attending training programs and (2) stress the application of training content to the job Managers can also facilitate transfer through use of action plans.. Peer Support- A support network is a group of two or more trainees who agree to meet and discuss their progress in using learned capabilities on the job, face-to-face meetings or communications via e-mail. Opportunity to Perform -Trainee is provided with or actively seeks experience using newly learned knowledge, skills, or behavior. Technological Support: EPSS and Knowledge Management Systems Technological Support- Electronic performance support systems (EPSS) are computer applications that can provide, as requested, skills training, information access, and expert advice. Knowledge management refers to the process of enhancing company performance by designing and implementing tools, processes, systems, structures, and cultures to improve the creation, sharing, and use of knowledge
• #19: Presentation Methods refer to methods in which trainees are passive recipients of information and include Instructor-led classroom instruction Distance learning Audiovisual techniques Mobile technologies Hands‑on methods includeon‑the‑job training, simulations, business games and case studies, behavior modeling, inter­active video, and Web-based training. Teleconferencing refers to synchronous exchange of audio, video, and/or text between two or more individuals or groups at two or more locations. Webcasting involves classroom instructions that are provided online through live broadcasts. Hands-on methods are training methods that require the trainee to be actively involved in learning. Hands-on methods include on-the-job training, simulations, business games and case studies, behavior modeling, interactive video, and Webbased training. On-the-job training (OJT) refers to new or inexperienced employees learning through observing peers or managers performing the job and trying to imitate their Behavior. Self-directed learning involves having employees take responsibility for all aspects of learning—when it is conducted and who will be involved Apprenticeship is a work-study training method with both on-the-job training and classroom training. A simulation is a training method that represents a real-life situation, with trainees’ decisions resulting in outcomes that mirror what would happen if the trainee were on the job E-learning or online learning refers to instruction and delivery of training by computers through the Internet or company intranets. E-learning includes Web-based training, distance learning, virtual classrooms, and use of CD-ROMs. E-learning can include task support, simulation training, distance learning, and learning portals. Blended learning combines online learning, face-to-face instruction, and other methods for distributing learning content and instruction A learning management system (LMS) refers to a technology platform that can be used to automate the administration, development, and delivery of all of a company’s training programs. Group- or team-building methods are training methods designed to improve team or group effectiveness. Team training coordinates the performance of individuals who work together to achieve a common goal. Adventure learning develops teamwork and leadership skills using structured outdoor activities. In action learning teams or work groups get an actual business problem, work on solving it and commit to an action plan, and are accountable for carrying out the plan. Six Sigma training provides employees with measurement and statistical tools to help reduce defects and to cut costs
• #20: Training outcomes can be categorized as cognitive outcomes, skill-based outcomes, affective outcomes, results, and return on investment. Table 7.9 shows the types of outcomes used in evaluating training programs and what is measured and how it is measured.Trainingoutcomescan be classified into four broad categories: cognitive, skill‑based, affective, results, and return on investment (text,Table 7.9).
• #21: Factors to consider in choosing an evaluation design include the size of the training program, purpose, and the implications if a training program does not work. Other factors include the company norms regarding evaluation, costs of designing and conducting an evaluation, andthe need for speed in obtaining program effectiveness information.
• #22: Determining Costs are training costs include direct and indirect costs. Determining Benefits identify the potential benefits of training, the company must review the original reasons for the training. Making the Analysis a cost‑benefit analysis is best explained by an example.
• #23: An expatriate works in a country other than his or her country of origin. Crosss-cultural preparation involves educating employees (and their families) who are given an assignment in a foreign country.
• #24: In the predeparture phase, employees need to receive language training and an orientation to the new country’s culture and customs. On-site training involves continued orientation to the host country and its customs and cultures through formal programs or through a mentoring relationship. Repatriation prepares expatriates for return to the parent company and country from a foreign assignment.
• #25: To successfully manage a diverse work force, companies need to ensure that: Employees understand how their values and stereotypes influence their behavior toward others of different gender, ethnic, racial, or religious backgrounds. Employees gain an appreciation of cultural differences among themselves. Behaviors that isolate or intimidate minority group member improve. Managing Diversity is the process of creating an environment that allows all employees to contribute to organizational goals and experience personal growth. 2 Types of Diversity Training: Attitude awareness and change programs Behavior based programs Attitude awareness and change programs focus on increasing employees’ awareness of differences in cultural and ethnic backgrounds, physical characteristics (such as disabilities), and personal characteristics that influence behavior toward others. Behavior-based programs focus on changing the organizational policies and individual behaviors that inhibit employees’ personal growth and productivity 2 Goals of Diversity Training: (1) to eliminate values, stereotypes, and managerial practices that inhibit employees’ personal development and therefore (2) to allow employees to contribute to organizational goals regardless of their race, sexual orientation, gender, family status, religious orientation, or cultural background.
• #26: Organizational Socialization refers to the process used to transform new employees into effective company members. Through anticipatory socialization, expectations about the company, job, working conditions, and interpersonal relationships are developed through interactions with representatives of the company (recruiters, prospective peers, and managers) during recruitment and selection. The expectations are also based on prior work experiences in similar jobs. The encounter phase occurs when the employee begins a new job. No matter how realistic the information provided during interviews and site visits, individuals beginning new jobs will experience shock and surprise. In the settling-in phase, employees begin to feel comfortable with their job demands and social relationships. They begin to resolve work conflicts (like too much work or conflicting job demands) and conflicts between work and non-work activities.
• #27: Technological innovations, new product markets, and a diverse workforce have increased the need for companies to reexamine how their training practices contribute to learning. This chapter discussed a systematic approach to training, including needs assessment, design of the learning environment, consideration of employee readiness for training, and transfer-of-training issues. The key to successful training was to choose a method that would best accomplish the objectives of training. Training can contribute to effectiveness through establishing a link with the company’s strategic direction and demonstrating through cost–benefit analysis how training contributes to profitability. Managing diversity and cross-cultural preparation are two training issues that are relevant given company needs to capitalize on a diverse workforce and global markets.